Democrats pounce on Bush uranium statement

[chomskyite2]

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Democrats see a weak spot and they're pouncing.

President Bush delivering his State of the Union address in January.
The White House opened itself to a barrage of criticism when it confirmed that the president's assertion in his State of the Union address that Iraq tried to buy uranium from Africa was based on unsubstantiated, and possibly false, information.

Speaking with me on Inside Politics Tuesday, Democratic Sen. Jay Rockefeller of West Virginia, vice chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, said, "We have to get to the bottom of this. It's a very important thing. We are in an era where you cannot say wrong things that give wrong impressions because everything is so fragile and on such a hair trigger."

Senate Minority Leader Tom Daschle echoed the sentiment Tuesday, cautioning against a rush to judgment but urging that "this ought to be reviewed very carefully... with regard to what it was we knew, what actions were taken, what statements were correct, and which ones were incorrect. The sooner we can acquire that information the better for the country."

more...

http://www.cnn.com/2003/ALLPOLITICS/07/09/judy.desk.democrats/

[whathappened]

1. why all the fooling around

just the facts jack is what they should be looking for , what a bunch of chicken shits we have there in dc , why don't they just throw the hammer down and go for the juggerler on jr. and his crowd of mighty nuts

[Cha]

2. I hope to hell they are "Pouncing",,,,,,it's a Pouncable offense!

duh!

[bluestateguy]

3. They'll capitulate

The Right Wing media machine will go ape shit, Sean Hannity and Tom DeLay will make something incomprehensible statement about "patriotism", and Tom Daschle will retract his demands for an investigation all in the name of bipartisanship.

[austinboy]

11. HAHAHAHAHAHA

Ain't that the truth!!! :eyes:

[roguevalley]

4. rush to judgment?

god, daschle, go home and have an enema.

[Divernan]

5. Crude but appropriate!

nt

[lostinspace]

6. Bush asked about Uranium in Africa Today

The AM news radio station in Chicago kept playing this over and over today.

A reporter in Africa asked Bush to comment on the fact that the information he used to make the Uranium statement in the STU address was false.

Bush went into a stammering response replying: "You want to know if
Iraq is trying to buy Uranium today. No they are not trying to buy
Uranium today". Which was not the question at all.

It was pathetic

[Maudlin]

7. "unsubstantiated, and possibly false"?

It was a crudely *forged* document claiming facts disproven years ago. They can find wriggle room in this?

[CWebster]

8. JRockefeller, on "Hardball" last night

remarked that the statement released from the whitehouse was "scary" due to it's anonymity.

[GalleryGod]

9. Step BACK and Look at the Mosaic of Corruption !

Someone has to bring that to the table!
They want to dribble these little "incident tiles",if you will, out there-somebody needs to start saying, "Hey! ,Murica! Look at this Big Pixs-ture!?"
;>)

[justicebuilder]

10. Context

If the media machine has a central purpose, it is to obscure context. If you are waiting for them to show the big picture you will be waiting a long time.

The uranium story is a perfect example. So many news outlets are now asking about the Niger documents. Yet zero articles put the forgeries in the proper context.

Administration officials went on television THE WEEK BEFORE the Senate voted to grant * power to invade Iraq, all repeating the mantra - "The next warning will be a mushroom cloud over D.C." There were two main pieces of evidence generally used to support this wildly irresponsible fearmongering.

One of those pieces of "evidence" was an IAEA report that did not exist. * didn't even bother to have those documents forged; he just made them up. The other was the Niger documents, which were known at the time to be forgeries. If the White House didn't know they were forgeries it's because they didn't ask anyone.

If anyone has mentioned this in the press, I have not seen it. Yet it is plain as day to anyone that looks that congress was convinced to vote for war in Iraq on the basis of a threat that did not exist. Whether they were deliberately lied to or whether those administration officials were simply grossly incompetent, lazy, ignorant and foolish is a matter subject to debate. The fact itself is not.

jb

[CWebster]

12. Congress was in a better position to know

more than anyone what lies they were flooding the air with.

It was obvious to a good portion of the world that a case had not been made, and there were those who voted against giving their constitutional power away and they took the heat for standing their ground. They proved their worth.

Those who feared political repercussions from taking the correct and moral stand in opposition to the popular fear-driven mob consensus, should NOT be now rewarded with consideration for the presidency.

Period.